Fender Noiseless pickup question...

Ok, so the Noiseless pickups have "Noiseless" written on them, as is evident by the American Deluxe Jazz. However, mine is older, a '97. And I've seen a few Deluxes from around that time that have pickups like mine.

The new ones have "Noiseless" written on them in gold and 2 silver dot thingies for each string (dual coil? I'm not good with pickups).

Mine have nothing written and 1 dot for each string (single coil?) Take a look at the attatchment...

First of all, what's the correct terminology? As you can see, I don't know much about pickups. Secondly, what difference is there? I'm pretty sure mine are also Noiseless, because there is no hum whatsoever no matter how I balance my pickups. I heard that my kind of pickup (whatever its called) has more mid and a crisper tone. Anyone care to enlighten me? Thanks.

Originally posted by jenderfazz First of all, what's the correct terminology? As you can see, I don't know much about pickups. Secondly, what difference is there? I'm pretty sure mine are also Noiseless, because there is no hum whatsoever no matter how I balance my pickups. I heard that my kind of pickup (whatever its called) has more mid and a crisper tone. Anyone care to enlighten me? Thanks.

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I think the correct terminology would be poles or pole pieces but someone else may have a better answer. As for the difference between your pups and the new Noiseless pups, I can't help you with that. I do have two bases with Noiseless sets on them (A 2001 MIA Deluxe Jazz and a modified 1990 MIJ Standard Jazz). Both have nice mids and crisp tone IMO.

One, more thing. you would never even know that my Standard Jazz has a Noiseless set. The pickup covers with the gold writing on them would not fit in the basses cavities without routing. (It was not that important to me to see that logo so I used the stock pickup covers instead. The pickups fit in them just fine and I didn't have to shave off any wood.

The pickups you have in your bass were designed by John Suhr (I believe) & were in the 1st few generations of the American Deluxe Jazz basses. They are also offered in the Mexician Deluxe Jazz Basses. These are stacked p/u's which make them hum-cancelling (aka:noisless) when one pickup is soloed.

The new "Noiseless" Pickup is part of tyhe newer generation of the Deluxe basses. 1st it was the Noisless p/u with the same 9V pre-amp that is in you bass, now they are using a new 18V pre-amp as in the Victor Bailey bass.

Personally, I think the bass you have sounds ALOT BETTER than the newer ones with the "Toneless" pickups. I was working @ Sam Ash during that transistion & got to AB alot of them. IMO, the Mexican Deluxes also sound better than the new USA Deluxes.

Originally posted by Nino-Brown Personally, I think the bass you have sounds ALOT BETTER than the newer ones with the "Toneless" pickups.

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I was expecting to hear from you because you've always been very open about expressing your disdain for the Noiseless pups. Oh yeah, neither of my sets are Toneless. In fact they are the opposite of that description IMO.

I'm not thrilled by the electronics in my Fender USA Deluxe Jazz. Don't know if I should blame the noiseless pickups or the preamp. Can't decide which to change out first. I'll trade my 8-pole pickups for those 4-pole pickups!

Well I have been playing my other basses for the past few months and in spite of my Deluxe V being the "best" bass I own, can't find a sound I like. My Carvin fretless 5 string when set with the EQ flat is a bigger rounder sound but it is also a clearer and punchier sound than anything I can get with the Fender V. The B string on the carvin is also much better defined. My four string MIA standard jazz is also a beautiful sounding instrument and within a few minutes, I can find a clear, round, present, sound with it as well. In spite of trying every string on the planet, my "good" bass is still falling short on clear and round. I think it's time for surgery.

I hear ya. I can't from any experience with the MIA Deluxe V but I do have a Deluxe IV that I feel gets the tone that you're descibing without a lot of fuss. I settled in with D'Addario Slowound & EXP strings for all of my basses and I'm happy. Does your bass have the alder body? My IV's body is natural ash.

I have a 97 MIA Jazz Deluxe 5 and a 2002 FMT V. The older bass has the single pole piece pickups, the FMT V has noiseless. I like both and if anything the only one that's ever displayed noise is the FMT.

Has anyone seen a difference between the FMT and the regular Am. Deluxe? Tonally, I mean. Also, would you say the new "Noiseless" pickups sound like traditional Fender pickups, as Fender says? And how do they sound on a passive bass (as far as I know, they don't come stock on any passive basses)?

Originally posted by jenderfazz And how do they sound on a passive bass (as far as I know, they don't come stock on any passive basses)?

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I have a set installed on an MIJ Standard Jazz and I also added a J-Retro at the same time. All I can say is that I think that it sounds great in passive mode. It's definitely and improvement over the stock electronics but I don't know if it's the J-Retro, pickups or a combination of the two that the caused the enhanced performance. Probably a little of both.

The J-Retro is a heckuva piece of electronics. It squeezes every last drop of tone from a passive pickup, because it doesn't load it down. The input impedance on each J-Retro channel is very high... perfect for a passive pickup. Each channel is fully isolated, again to prevent loading, unlike a passive pan pot. Tone controls are 'upstream' of the pickup, and behind the high impedance connection point.

It is my understanding the stacked noiseless models have a different tone than do the single coil (non-stacked) vintage types. DiMarzio claims to get true single coil tone by using the side-by-side configuration that Leo used in the P bass so long ago. Funny how that really old design seems to be the best, after so many years.

I have a American Standard Jazz V with a J-retro installed. This preamp is great!
The stock pickups have some rough edges in the high mid and highs for my taste. Not to mention the noise they pick up when soloed.
Have ordered a pair of Barts that fits the pickup cavities. These are dual coil pickups.
I don't expect them to sound exactly like single coils, cause they're not! Never really liked the sound of humbuckers in a bass.